Country in numbers – the story of Denmark

Today HMBIA News will tell you the story of HMB sport development in Denmark. We had an interview with Allan Schiller, a captain of the Copenhagen Medieval Fighting Club (CMFC). He answered our questions and that what we found out.

When did the HMB start in Denmark? How was it?
As far as I know it started out with Historical Reenactment back in the mid 2000’s. Later in 2012 the first group of Danish fighters participated in the World Championship “Battle of the Nations” in Poland, I was not there. But to answer your question, I joined the HMB movement in 2013. And in Croatia 2014 was my first HMB event. There I was as a mercenary for the Finnish team. At this point in Denmark all of the clubs with exception of my club the CMFC was the only HMB club in Denmark and our tournament at the Copenhagen Medieval Market was the only HMB tournament in Denmark. My long-term goal was to involve myself as much as I could with the HMB tournaments and to get my club to participate in tournaments in countries like Russia and Ukraine, because we wanted to fight the best, to be among the best.

Because I believed that the HMB movement had a huge potential and now today when I look back, I can see I was right. Now all the clubs in Denmark fight in the HMB tournaments and are traveling to different countries and it’s very rare when you can see a high profile tournament without the Danish flag.

How many Clubs are there in Denmark?
We have 6 clubs here in Denmark, as far as I know we are all growing and the HMB movement is getting bigger. But we also have a very strong competition here in Denmark which I believe is healthy for the movement. We are so lucky here in Denmark that the top 3 teams are competing amongst themselves to get better and stronger.

How many fighters are in clubs in general?
I think it varies of who is a fighter? Is he one who comes once in awhile for practice and have no armor or is a person who has sport optimized armour and is training every week? If the first one is a fighter then I guess we have 20-30 fighters per club in average. If the last one is a fighter then the number is 8-9 fighters per club. But this all depend on the individual club.

How many certificated national and international marshals do you have?
Unfortunately, for now we have only one certified Marshall, we are trying to have a HMB Marshall seminar each year at the Copenhagen Medieval Market. Because we desperately need more.

Are there any kind of rivalry between clubs?
Yes, right now in Denmark we have two national organizations both of them have their different ideas and rules of conduct. Each organization consists of two or three clubs. And there are some rivalry between them. Then you have my club. We have chosen not to be a part in either national organizations, since we do not share the same ideas and code of conducts as the rest. So yes there are a lot of quarrels between our clubs. But I also think it makes our clubs stronger, because we train to fight each other and we train hard. I think this has helped the level of fighters rise a lot. It has turned into a healthy competition mentality.

How do you evaluate the qualification level of fighters in your country. Could you please describe with some examples?
Our fighters and clubs are performing really well in such tournaments as Dynamo cup, Call of Heroes and tournaments spread out across Europe.

How many tournaments have been held in 2017?
We had held around 10 tournaments in Denmark in 2017 including big and small once.

Do you have particularly strong outstanding fighters? Could you tell about them?
I think all of our teams have strong fighters. To mention them all would take to much time.

Summarize and plans for the future

What was new in the HMB movement in Denmark last year?
We have been getting more and more “3 vs 3″ tournaments.

Do fighters treat HMB as a hobby or as a serious kind of sports and try to earn skills as much as possible?
I think that is a 50/50 thing. Some clubs do and some clubs not do.

What are the tasks for developing HMB for the nearest future?
The hope is to form a male team in category “21 vs 21” for HMB. (HOPE)

We thank Allan for the information about HMB in Denmark and wish the entire Danish community to develop and become stronger every year.